The 1 MWe biogas plant in Třeboň, South Bohemia, is the first Czech biogas plant with significant supply of heat. The plant is situated about 2 km north from the town’s periphery and the input substrates are pig slurry and energy crops, mainly corn and grass silage.

The special design feature is only a small (175 kWe) cogeneration unit at the spot to cover the electricity and heat self consumption of biogas production, while the majority of produced raw gas is transported by a dedicated 4 km long pipeline to the spa facility in the town, where a new biogas CHP plant (844 kWe) was built, which supplies heat to the spa central heating system and an adjacent multi-apartment residential building. Two heat accumulators with total volume of 200 m³ are installed to equalize the daily fluctuations of heat demand.

Thanks to this concept (developed with SEVEn’s participation), most of the heat generated can be effectively used and the overall efficiency of biogas energy utilization is about 60% compared to typically only 35% at biogas plants with no heat supply.

The biogas plant in Třeboň is in operation since December 2009 but the owners deliberately postponed the official inauguration until sufficient operational experience has been collected. The project won the award “The Czech Energy and Environmental Project of the Year 2009”. The inauguration took place on June 29, 2011 and was attended by over 50 people who were guided through the biogas production plant and the bio-CHP plant in the spa. The event also attracted significant national media attention (see regional news at ČT24, the Czech TV news channel).